This went down in Birmingham, England at a Vue movie theater. Ateeq Rafiq was only 24. Mr Raafiq is survived by his wife and his one-year-old.
Vue Cinema has been fined £750,000 after a customer died at Star City when he was trapped and crushed under a faulty chair. … At the end of the film he realised he could not find either his keys or his phone and suspected they may have slipped down the side of the reclining seat, which had a footrest which pulled up.
He got up and went under the seat but very quickly the footrest started to come down on him.
Ben Mills, prosecuting, said: "He would not have been aware that the foot rest automatically returned to the closed position in a period of a few seconds.
"He tried to shuffle out but it was pushing down on him because of the faulty installation."
The ruling judge said, "It was an accident that never should have happened.”
"Others were exposed to the same risk of harm. There were 15 chairs in regular use throughout the cinema over the relevant period of time.
"The complete lack of risk assessment to identify the risk in this case was significant."
She said she had taken into account the company's lack of previous convictions, their positive health and safety record and the steps taken to remedy the problem.
Cutting corners should never be ok when it comes to safety. This poor man was just out for a movie with his wife and ended up losing his life. Glad the judge held the chain accountable and was crystal clear about why.